How to Turn Off (Disable) Cox’s 404 Hijacking/Interception

A few months ago I used Time Warner / Road Runner as my ISP here in San Diego and one day I typed in a web address that didn’t exist. Normally, the internet and my browser work well together by simply giving me some kind of error page. On that fatal day, instead, my browser redirected me to some crappy hijacked ad-filled interception page.

I did find a way to fix it, and shared that information with you. You were thankful, so I’m happy to share some more info, but this time from Cox.

Today, I ran into the same issue that we saw before. Cox did what’s called a DNS hijack. They say they do this because it’s better for their customers to find what they are looking for (which they really aren’t), but if they were honest and transparent they’d really tell us it’s a way to make a few more bucks. All the “search results” are just sponsored ads from one of the major ad networks. And, as I’m not really opposed to them trying to make extra money, it doesn’t provide value to the end consumer, so it’s pretty slimy. Oh, and it breaks the way the internet was supposed to work.

Now, all that to say, Cox does still give us a DNS setting that we can use to get back to normal. Straight from their support website, here’s how you can “fix” the problem:

How to Turn off Cox’s 404 (DNS) Hijacking

From the Start menu, click Control Panel.

In Category View, click Network and Internet Connections.

Click Network Connections.

From the Network Connections window, right-click Local Area Connection and select Properties.

From the General tab, select Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), then click Properties.

From the General tab, click Use the following DNS server addresses.

Enter the following Preferred and Alternate DNS Server Addresses in order:

Nate! I cannot thank you enough for this information. I could not locate it at the Cox support site, and I learned the hard way that you don’t call or email Cox about it. They say it is a problem with IE or Firefox. I’m not illiterate. I can read finder.cox.net, even though it has to appear on a braille display.

Thanks! Why do cable providers think it’s so important to steal into our private lives and give us something we hate, thus engendering further consternation, when they could instead engender respect and admiration. “Hi there sir, and thank you for ordering a hot dog. I know you asked for a hot dog. Here is a bagel instead. You don’t want the bagel, and I’m sure you’ll be delighted to learn, that every time you ask for a hot dog, you will get a bagel, unless you perform excruciatingly annoying steps to force me to give you what you ask for. It’s my policy to give you bagels when you ask for hot dogs. I’m sure this policy of mine will endear me to you in all your estimation. Am I on your Christmas Card list yet?” Yeeesh!

I have windows 7 and cox cable/internet. When I log into my cox email account it then show a screen if I have messages. When I click on to see my messages I am redirected to another page to pick my location, then to another page to relogin. This is SOOO annoying. I tried changing the DNS to 68.105.28.13 / 68.105.29.13 and it still does not fix this..

Any help would be grately appreciated please….I am ready to find a different source to deal with my email….Thanks for all help and insight on my behalf…John

I would go with Chris’s suggestion of using OpenDNS server’s. If you set it to Google’s DNS server’s Google will be data mining all you DNS queries.

I would also make sure you set the DNS static at your Firewall/Router not at the computer. By doing that all your devices in your home and your office will go to the router first and the router will query OpenDNS’s servers. Any new devices added to the network will also route DNS queries to OpenDNS’s servers.

Settings:
208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220
208.67.222.220
208.67.220.222

Use the first two in that order, the rest if your router provides additional DNS entries.

I did this at one time, and then went to visit at someones house who uses ATT and I could not get an internet connection, so I’m thinking that likely if you do this, if you then venture out of the Cox network you may have issues getting a connections, am I right on this?

Rightiness

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.

~ Abraham Lincoln

Truthiness

For myself, I long ago decided that I would rather know the truth than be happy in ignorance. If I cannot have both truth and happiness, give me truth. We'll have a long time to be happy in heaven.